Lord, you test my heart by putting me under authority. I wrestle with obedience. But you are gracious. Grant me a heart willing to yield to You above all and to those you have put over me.
Sometimes American movies can be predictable. A typical plotline goes something like this. A powerful authority perpetuates some injustice — let’s say racial discrimination. A common person gets caught up in the injustice and wants to change it. This person then stands proudly defiant against a corrupt system or a powerful leader, experiences many struggles, but in the end prevails. Events vindicate him.
These are America’s heroes, and these heroes say something about America. We like our heroes to rebel. Even when those in power are truly unjust and the hero is in the right, he often resists in the wrong way, for he often demonstrates a defiance that Lucifer himself would be proud of. The externals are gold. The attitude is poison. Many of our heroes do not know how to stand against authority because they do not know how to obey it. A rebel is the least qualified person to rebel.
Some things have a way of revealing the nature of a heart. Authority is one of those things. The universe is founded on authority, and all lesser authorities, like husbands, fathers, governments, elders, and employers, derive their authority from God. Consequently, our attitude toward authority reveals much about our attitude toward God.
David would not lift his hand against the king who wanted to kill him. Saul may have been a coward and a wicked man, but he was still “the Lord’s anointed.” David could have killed Saul in the cave. Instead, he cut off a corner of Saul’s garment, and that very act smote David’s conscience. His spirit was sensitive to authority. Ours is not. David would not criticize the leader who wanted to kill him. We criticize a leader who has a style different from our own. David feared God. We often do not.
This issue of authority and our response to it is enormous because the central conflict of the human race is this: who is in charge? You and I answer that question a thousand times a day. Our choices answer it. Our attitude towards the current government, our talk about a teacher or boss, our willingness or reluctance to listen to the Spirit of God, all these show daily who we really think is in charge. The human heart, at its core, wants to be in charge. It wants to be like the Most High. That is why the human heart, in its natural state, will not follow Christ.
The proper response to authority is obedience, respect, and submission. We cringe when we hear those words. The cringing itself communicates a bias and a heart attitude. Something inside us does not want to submit. What then will we do when we meet the One before whom the only proper response is to fall on our faces? Obedience, respect, and submission must be the default heart attitude toward authority. If we will not submit to our employer whom we can see, then we will not submit to God whom we cannot see. If we are quick to stretch local laws to suit ourselves, then we will be quick to stretch the Bible to suit ourselves. If we disrespect our president because we do not like his policies, we will be apt to disrespect God because we do not like His policies.
Scripture does talk about a time to disobey earthly authority (e.g. Acts 4:19-20), but such disobedience is the exception, not the norm. Too often we make it the norm.
In the army I worked under authority. I was a company executive officer with a company commander over me, and a battalion commander over him, and a brigade commander over him, and a division commander over him, and so on. Everyone is under authority. If my division commander (a general) and my company commander (a captain) had told me to do opposite things, obviously I would need to obey my division commander, for he has a higher authority. That situation would be rare. The norm, however, is that my division commander would expect all the soldiers under him to obey their local chain of command. It would be no contradiction for him to say to me, “Obey your captain.” In fact, if I disobeyed my captain, I would be subject to military discipline, and the general would uphold it, for when I disobeyed my captain, I disobeyed the entire authority structure, of which the general is a part.
Authority in the real world is like this. God is like the commander in chief. My government is a captain. A father at home is a colonel. God wants me to obey and respect my captain and colonel because when I do, I am showing respect to authority, and He is the ultimate authority. I may disobey my captain or colonel only in those rare circumstances when they tell me to do something that contradicts what a higher authority has declared.
This is why our response to authority is so important. Authority represents God. We yield as if yielding to God (Eph 5:22; 6:5).
When you see genuine respect for authority, you are seeing a heart attitude that God delights in, but when you see people continually gripe about those over them, you are seeing an attitude that does not come from God. Either way, you are glimpsing the heart.
